C4 To Go Inside Children's Hospital

Channel 4 has announced a new series set in one of the largest and most advanced paediatric units in the world, Birmingham Children's Hospital.

With unprecedented scale of institutional access, Inside Birmingham Children's Hospital is a brand new series, exploring modern day parenting through just some of the hundreds of thousands of patient visits here.

It follows children and their families on their journeys through 34 specialist departments and further afield into their homes across Britain. With intimate, long-form access to households across a vast spectrum of contemporary British society, the series discovers parental hopes and fears that are truly universal.

Using the latest in mobile and fixed camera technology the series takes viewers into the drama of a Children's Emergency Department, to the bedsides of one of the largest intensive care units in Europe, where fixed rig filming has been allowed for the first time, and through life-changing surgery; all set against conversations round the dinner table at home and the fraught, funny and all too recognisable family car journeys to and from the hospital.

The series also features and hears from more than 50 members of staff ranging from leading surgeons and Emergency consultants to specialised nurses, technicians and clinical child psychologists as they care not just for their patients, but the emotional wellbeing of the whole families they have in tow.

During the series, we'll follow a number of stories; from life-threatening illnesses and deeply personal psychological challenges to time-honoured childhood bumps and scrapes. These will include:
• The acute anxiety of parents of a 16 year old who's facing pioneering brain surgery to change a life dominated by epilepsy
• The courage of a father who donates part of his own liver to his 14 year old son
• The frustration of a mum arguing with her teenage daughter over whether or not she should have a cosmetic eye procedure
• The strength and sensitivity of a father helping his daughter through depression
• As well as a football tackle gone wrong, a finger trapped in a door slammed by a big sister, a micro-scooter mishap, a tumble at a Christening and much more.

Set in the heart of Britain's second city, the series combines single camera documentary filmmaking with a multi-camera rig set up throughout the hospital to give a 360 degree perspective on the whole hospital, its staff and of course, those that pass through its doors daily.

David Brindley, Commissioning Editor for Documentaries at Channel 4 said: "Inside Birmingham Children's Hospital will be an uplifting exploration and celebration of what it means to be a parent - and a child - in Britain today. As we join families at moments of high emotion, there will be tears and tantrums, but lots of love and laughter too. The series will be a heart-warming journey into how families function in our country today."

channel4.com